County

Oxfordshire Travelled to Cheltenham on Wednesday 30th August for the annual friendly against neighbours Gloucestershire. Losing 4 rinks the results on the rinks skipped by Alan Ley and Mick Morris were sufficient to give Oxfordshire victory by 8 shots.

A beautiful day for bowling on Saturday saw the OBA playing away to Buckinghamshire at the Stony Stratford bowls Club in the final game of this season’s HCBA Denny league.

At stake was the wooden spoon, with Oxfordshire having had their worst season in the league for a long time and having this last chance of notching up a victory to lift them from the bottom of the league.

In a close game on the scoreboard a six shot lead across the rinks after ten ends turned into a five shot deficit after fifteen ends and worse still a sixteen shot shortfall after eighteen. With one end left to play the OBA had fought back and had moved into a three shot lead on the game but were unable to hold on to the third wood which would have produced a one shot victory and lifted them off the bottom. The three dropped shots on the last end played, left the game all square at 126 shots each, three winning rinks each and 11 points each.

Following on from a convincing win at Bristol the previous week hopes were high of a repeat performance. Steady progress on most rinks maintained the hopes with a lead of ten shot after 18 ends Then a by now fight back by the opposition saw the lead disappear by the end of the match and a defeat by 2 shots.

The award ceremony was shorter this week on the Oxfordshire side with a 50 game badge awarded to Carterton’s George Weedon and an honourable mention to John Timms on reaching 150 games.

The Men’s Domestic Finals day was hosted at Witney Town Bowling Club on Sunday with 3 competitions played, the Allison Cup, Longford Cup and the Officers Cup.

The first semi-final of the day saw 2014 Allison Cup winner, Phil Gladden of Adderbury, back to try and regain the title, playing against Buford’s John Hurren. The game was very evenly matched throughout with no player able to gain more than a 4 shot advantage before Gladden picked up two back to back 3 shot pick-ups to take him 18-12 in front. Hurren fought back well to get it to 18-16 before Gladden ended the game picking up 3 singles. Gladden through the final 21-16 victor.

The second Allison Cup semi-final was between Banbury Central’s Ian Gilbert and Witney Town’s Brian Smith. The game started very evenly matched and after 10 ends it was 7-6 to Smith. However a big push from Smith enabled him to pick up 9 shots in 4 ends without reply taking him 16-6 in front. The next 7 ends only single shots were picked up by both competitors taking the score to 19-10 in Smith’s favour before a 4 shot pickup gave Gilbert a glimmer of hope, although this was short lived as Smith picked up the 2 shots required to book his place in the afternoon’s final, 21-14 victor.
The next game of the morning saw the Officers Cup semi-final between South Oxford’s Keith Mobley and Carterton’s Tim Jupp. With Banbury Central’s Nigel Galletly already booking his place in the final by beating Witney Town’s Tim Ludlow 21 shots to 15 earlier on in the week, it was down to the other two to fight for the other final spot. A strong start from Mobley saw him take a 13 shot to 5 advantage before Jupp battled to bring the score to 13-11 down. The next couple of ends saw Mobley pick up 4 shots taking him 17-11 in front before Jupp regained the mat for the last time picking up 1 shot. The final two ends saw 2 doubles from Mobley taking him over the line 21-12 winner.

The first Longford Cup semi-final was the longest game of the morning taking the competitors 2 and a half hours and 28 ends played before a winner was decided. Witney Town’s Tim Ludlow was up against Headington’s Bernie May. May got off to a good start taking 6 shots without reply before Ludlow stepped into gear and picked up 8 shots back in succession. From then on there was never more than 3 shots separating the competitors with the lead changing several times during the tussle. The last 8 ends saw only single shot pick-ups but it was Ludlow who took 5 of them to take him to the final as 21-18 winner.

The final game of the morning was the second Longford Cup semi-final between Headington’s Dennis Crook and last year’s winner, Witney Town’s Brian Bloomfield. A strong performance from the start saw Bloomfield take an early 14 shot to 1 lead after 7 ends before Crook fought back to pick up 6 shots in 7 ends taking the score to 18-7. Bloomfield then picked up the three he needed the following end to secure his space in the Longford final, 21-7 victor.

A Fish and Chip lunch was enjoyed by competitors, spectators and officials before the finals got underway in the afternoon sunshine.

The Officers Cup was played on the show rink between Keith Mobley and Nigel Galletly, with excellent bowling throughout from both competitors. The tight final saw neither competitor able to gain more than 2 shot gap throughout the whole duration. 8 shots apiece at 9 ends went up to 12-11 in Mobley’s favour. After 21 ends both players had scored 18 and it could have gone either way when 2 singles gave Galletly a 20-18 shot lead and he was holding game when Mobley managed to win the end taking it to a tense 20-19. A fantastic bowl from Galletly left him an unmovable shot and ran out 21-19 in what was a fantastic battle.

The Longford Cup was an all Witney Town affair between Tim Ludlow and Brian Bloomfield. A very strong start from Ludlow saw him go 10-3 in front after 6 ends and then battled to keep his lead which gave him 15 shots to 6 at 10. Bloomfield managed to win three ends on the bounce before Ludlow quickly replied picking up 5 shots in 2 ends. Bloomfield picked up a double on the 16th end to take the score to 20-11 down. Ludlow had a fantastic last end which saw him take the trophy from last year’s winner, 21-11 victor.
The last final played was the Allison Cup between Phil Gladden and Brian Smith. Once again another close and tense game to begin with which saw the score at 7-5 in Smith’s favour at 10 ends. Gladden then scored on 5 ends without reply taking him into the lead, 11-7 before another 6 shots scored over the next 5 ends taking Gladden to a comfortable 17-9 lead. 5 excellent ends by Smith followed which brought him right back into contention taking him into the lead 18-17. Gladden managed to score another 2 shots before Smith ran out the winner 21-19 after some fantastic bowls by both.

Presentation of the trophies for the afternoon’s winners were presented by Bill Jarvie and saw the day come to a close.

A huge thanks to Witney Town Bowling Club for hosting the domestic cup finals day and providing superb facilities and catering throughout the day.

Another big thank you goes to the markers for the day, Allan Hall, Steve Tolhurst, Mike Jones, Paul Demczak and Alan Scholan; also thanks are due to the umpire for the multiple calls he tended to all day.

Oxfordshire travelled to Bristol St Andrews on Tuesday 8th August to play City and county of Bristol.

With a level start on the first 15 ends Oxfordshire reversed their habit of the last few games and finished strongly on the last six ends to win by 18 shots. The award ceremony was an unusual mixture of not so young and the very young with a 200 game badge awarded to OBA Secretary Steve Tolhurst, a 50 game badge to OBA Assistant Match Secretary Alex Fleming and a first game badge to teenager Joe Justin, relieving the anxiety of waiting his GCSE results. All 3 completed a successful day with raffle prizes.

Oxfordshire entertained Middlesex at Kidlington on 5th August looking for their first win in this season’s Home Counties League campaign.

Starting well Oxfordshire built a slender lead of 7 shots by end 5. The lead evaporated in the next 5 ends and by end 10 they trailed by 7 shots Middlesex retained the lead for the next 5 ends, and then Oxfordshire reduced the deficit to 4 after 18 ends A further gain of 2 shots left Oxfordshire behind by 2 shots. Wins on rinks 1 to 4 were cancelled out by losses on rinks 5 and 6.

A 50 game badge was awarded to Richard Barnett of Witney Mills BC and a 6 game badge to David Latter of Carterton BC.

The Domestic cup finals day will be hosted at Witney Town Bowls Club Sunday 6th August. Semi final games are commencing at 10:00am. Bacon rolls and registration from 09:15am. Lunch available to order upon arrival for spectators and competitors.